


Safe House

by Kaibutsu_of_Shinjuku (Lightningpelt)



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Best Friends, Friendship, Gen, Twisted and Fluffy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-04-29
Packaged: 2018-06-05 05:04:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6690832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lightningpelt/pseuds/Kaibutsu_of_Shinjuku
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Izaya needs a place to hole up for the night, and Shinra is thrilled to have an actual friend over to hang out. He would be more thrilled, however, if Izaya would let him brag to Celty about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Safe House

**Author's Note:**

> So I'm gonna level with you guys, the whole Shinra + Izaya friendship dynamic... is like my weakness. My heart and soul. Like one of my literal favorite things. Honestly, you could probably already tell, since Shinra makes appearances in most of my Shizaya fics.   
> But yeah. I hope you guys like this one, and please expect to see more of these two from me forever and always. <3 Do not hesitate to hit me up with requests for them, either. The world needs more of their beautiful(??) friendship.

“Psst! Hey…! Hey, Shinra…!”

The young doctor looked around curiously, startled by the whispered voice on the balcony of his fifth-floor apartment.

“Orihara-kun?”

Izaya peeked over the railing, his knuckles white in the light of the porch lamp. “Hey…” he huffed softly. “You alone?”

Shinra nodded, a vacant smile on his face.

“Whew!” With a visible effort, Izaya heaved himself over the railing and flopped, boneless, at Shinra’s feet. “I’ve been waiting for you to come out for almost an hour…! I thought my shoulders were going to tear off!”

“Do you want to come in?” Shinra asked, beginning to turn. “I’ll let Celty know—”

“No, no!” Izaya cut him off quickly, springing to his feet. “Don’t tell your lovely headless girlfriend I’m here! In fact, don’t tell anyone, please? I’m sort of—heh, laying low for the night. A certain… thing… isn’t going to come through with a certain… group… until tomorrow, and I’m in a certain… sort of… pickle.”

Shinra’s eyes narrowed slightly—disapproving, but not severely so. “Orihara-kun…”

Izaya smiled weakly. “Sorry. Can I stay the night?” 

Shinra sighed, then motioned. “Wait here. I think Celty’s asleep, but I’ll go check.”

Izaya’s expression melted further until he was grinning a lopsided, relieved sort of smile. He sunk to the ground as Shinra vanished through the glass doors, then looked up when the would-be doctor returned a moment later.

“Coast is clear. C'mon in.”

Izaya nodded, climbing sluggishly to his feet and then following Shinra with silent steps. Once he was bathed in the florescent light of the living room, it became clear he wasn’t just hiding preemptively.

Shinra didn’t speak until they had ducked into his room, but as soon as the door shut he said, “I’ll treat that first.”

“You don’t have to do all that,” Izaya said flippantly, keeping his voice low; he wiped the blood from under his bangs with the heal of one hand absentmindedly. “It’s just a scratch. It does’t even hurt. Kinda… stings, maybe, but that’s it.”

“If it gets infected, it’ll do a lot more than sting,” Shinra replied, vanishing into his bathroom and returning with basic medical supplies. “And please,” he added, “I’m a doctor.  It’s my sworn duty to do at least this much.”

Izaya made a disgruntled noise, but didn’t object when Shinra took his shoulders and guided him to sit on the bed, then crouched beside him and pinned his bangs back with a flowery barrette.

“Ouch…” The young information broker grimaced as Shinra dabbed an alcohol swab against the wound. “Ow…”

“Oh hush,” Shinra chided, then grabbed a roll of bandages. The gash was wider than Izaya might have admitted, and so the doctor wrapped the gauzy material around his entire head. “Anywhere else?”

Izaya hesitated, then admitted, “He got me on the back.”

Shinra nodded, then scooted around and gently lifted Izaya’s shirt. He drew a breath between grit teeth then he saw the burn.

“Don’t make this weirder than it is…” Izaya grumbled, then asked softly, “Is it really that bad? I mean, I could tell it was outdated by the feel of it, but—”

“There’s no deep tissue damage,” Shinra cut him off gently. “It must’ve hurt like hell, though. It’s been a while since I’ve seen a stun-gun burn this bad… the damn thing had to be at least a decade off the market…”

“Cheap bastards…” Izaya grumbled.

“You should be glad!” Shinra scolded. “If it was a newer model you would have been out for the count!”

“Fair enough,” Izaya admitted, then hissed as the doctor began to dab at the wound. “Shit…!”

“Hush,” Shinra crooned, then gingerly dressed the burn. After a few minutes, he replaced Izaya’s shirt. “There. All done.”

“Bastard…” Izaya groaned, then shook his head. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” Shinra replied, smiling. “What are friends for?”

As Izaya searched for words to reply, Shinra leaped up as if remembering something. He clapped his hands once, then held them up palms-forward.

“Stay here, stay here!”

Izaya drew a breath, but Shinra was gone before he could speak—or even figure out what he wanted to say. So he let it out as a sigh, then settled onto Shinra’s bed. His back ached as he laid against it, but he ignored the pain until he managed to get comfortable.

It felt nice to relax—nicer, certainly, than constantly looking over his shoulder.

When Shinra didn’t return, however, Izaya’s muscles slowly began to tense. Doubts tapped insistently at the insides of his skull, and he started to wonder if he should cut and run while he had the chance. What had convinced him, after all, that Shinra could be trusted? He didn’t _want_ to think ill of the one person he might be able to call ‘friend,’ but even such a short time in his chosen line of work had taught him that trust was not often a good thing.

Furthermore, as he had always believed, better to protect himself rather than give others an opening. Physical wounds didn’t phase him—emotional ones, however, he knew he wouldn’t be able to withstand, and that frightened him on a primal level.

Better not to risk it.

Just as he had made up his mind to leave, however, the door opened once again. Izaya tensed, one hand automatically sliding into his coat for his knife, but he stopped when he saw what Shinra was carrying.

“Sorry I don’t have anything up to your standards!” the doctor said, still keeping his voice low as he kicked the door shut behind him. The words, though they had the potential to be sardonic, were earnest. “I know you have sort of refined tastes, but I scrounged the best I could!”

“You don’t have to feed me, Shinra,” Izaya stated dumbly, his mind churning through the hopeless confusion that had swamped it. “I’m just—”

“This is the first time I’ve ever had a friend over!” Shinra cut him off cheerfully, then gave a gentle smile. “I want to do this right, you know. Tea and refreshments are the first thing you offer guests, right?”

And Izaya, after a moment, gave a stifled chuckle. “I guess you’re right,” he admitted, then held out his hands. “Never mind my stupid tastes. Give it here.”

Shinra beamed. “Great!” Then, as Izaya took the food, he took on a perturbed expression. “Pity I won’t be able to tell Celty about this…!” he sighed. “She’d really like that I had an actual friend over! She’s always saying I should have more social interaction…”

Through a mouthful of rice, Izaya echoed, “Pity.”

“Pity…” Shinra repeated glumly, then sat down heavily beside his friend. Seeming to revive slightly, he gave Izaya a smile that stunned the young information broker. “I’m still glad you stopped over, though! This is fun, having a friend over!”

Ignoring the fact that the situation was anything but a normal meeting between ordinary friends, Izaya instead chose to attempt—though not exactly succeed, he knew—a returning of that smile. “I’m having fun, too, Shinra. Thanks for having me over.”

… … …

Izaya spent the night in Shinra’s bed; the doctor had insisted he take it while he slept on the floor. And the information broker, much to his surprise, had slept soundly. He laid low until Celty had left for the day, then emerged to find Shinra cooking breakfast. He had tried to leave, but the doctor physically blocked the door, saying he wouldn’t allow it until breakfast was eaten.

Izaya, although with the knowledge that he could overpower his friend in the back of his mind, had relented with a show of being thoroughly defeated.

The deal he had been working on came through, and Izaya had received a full and furtive apology for the attack by the time he made it back to his own apartment. He accepted it graciously, then smoothly segued into a request for confirmation of a certain rumor he had heard not two days prior. With a big fish at the end of his phone line, he felt decidedly accomplished—still an exasperatingly new feeling. Yet, he acknowledged, his plans wouldn’t be going so smoothly if he hadn’t survived the night. And that was something he hadn’t done entirely by his own merit. Alone—in the very best case scenario—he would have gone very hungry until it was safe to poke his nose out of whatever lonely hole he found to hide in. In the worst case scenario, he would be dead.

But Shina had considered him enough of a guest to provide him with not one but two meals, never mind a bed—never mind his smile.

… … …

It was two days later that there was a knock at Shinra Kishitani’s door. Celty looked up from her seat on the couch curiously as he rose to answer it.

“Hello, my friend!” Izaya greeted him with a crooked smile. “I’ve come to visit and 'hang out,’ as normal, good friends tend to do!

Though momentarily befuddled, Shinra slowly began to _beam_. And, before Izaya could dodge, he flung himself at his friend for a hug that didn’t suit such a strangely isolated boy—such a strangely isolated _pair_ of boys. Never the less, Izaya returned the embrace with a put-upon huff.

"You’re the best, Izaya!”

“And don’t you forget it, now.”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos mean the world, as do notes on the tumblr version of this fic! But regardless, sincerely, thank you for reading~


End file.
